• Question: If cancer could be cured would it evolve to protect itself from the cure

    Asked by artistic to Cathal, Ciara, Emma, Michael, Sive on 15 Nov 2013.
    • Photo: Sive Finlay

      Sive Finlay answered on 15 Nov 2013:

      Hi artistic 🙂
      Great question! I’m definitely not a cancer expert but I think the answer is yes.
      Cancer isn’t just one disease so there won’t be a single cure for it. Cancer describes lots of different diseases which are all characterised by uncontrolled cell division but this pattern can be the result of lots of different mutations in the cell. So if there was a cure for a particular type of cancer then it would have to work by stopping the cells from dividing so rapidly. The cure would have to target a very specific mutation in the cells so, even if that problem or mutation was “cured” then I guess there’s no reason why the cells couldn’t produce another mutation which also causes uncontrolled cell growth and therefore produces cancer.
      Sive

    • Photo: Michael Nolan

      Michael Nolan answered on 19 Nov 2013:

      Sine cancer is not one disease it is hard to say for sure. I suspect we will be constantly fighting some forms of cancer for as lomg as humans exist. There may be evolutionary changes in those cancers over time.
      M

Comments